Would you have had them, on their own responsibility, then and there decide this question for all time, and absolutely refuse to reserve it for the decision of Congress and of the American people, to whom that decision belongs, and who have the right to an opportunity first for its deliberate consideration?
Reid advocates for the importance of allowing Congress and the American people to make decisions regarding territorial status and civil rights.
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They should persist in this claim respectfully, but firmly, taking care to bring no discredit upon it by their own action.
Never was there a problem more serious or difficult than that which is now before the Nation, as to this race, whose destiny has been confided to the wisdom and honor of our Government.
In this way they will surely overcome unjust hostility, and convince even the most prejudiced that the denial to them of any right which citizens may properly exercise is equally unwise and wrong.
Let me repeat, that I think it best for all men—white men, black men, and brown men, if you make that distinction, that all men of proper age and unconvicted of crime, should have the right of suffrage.